How can we provide an authentic research experience to students who want to find out what science is REALLY about? We couple DS9 imaging software, a user friendly, fun-to-explore environment with a "virtual observatory" that allows analysis to be done remotely on UNIX-based computers, regardless of the platform employed by the user. All of NASA's archived satellite observations can be accessed by any interested student. Furthermore, by adapting VNC (Virtual Network Computer) software, we can enhance this flexibility enormously and allow instructors to view, comment on, and debug any analysis task in real-time, from anywhere in the world, and across all computing platforms. This makes these programs especially useful in distance learning environments.